In 2008, Professor Emeritus William Kornblum (Sociology) was commissioned by the Central Park Conservancy to conduct the widely cited Central Park User Survey and Count, which revealed that the number of annual visitors to the park had increased to 45 million from 25 over the past 15 years.

Now Michelle Ronda ’11 (Sociology) and Robin Isserles ’02 (Sociology), who worked with Kornblum on the survey, are leading a similar study of Battery City Park. Both are currently professors at CUNY’s Borough of Manhattan Community College (BMCC).

The Battery Park City Authority contracted the survey to help it assess the needs of park visitors and plan for future projects. Ronda said the students working on the current project will gain invaluable social science experience, as she did in her GC days, according to an article published by BMCC.

“Working with Bill Kornblum changed my entire life,” Ronda told the BMCC. “I never would have considered that this sort of research was something I could do as a career.”